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C. S. Lewis
Union of Britain |party= Maximists |events= }}Clive Staples Lewis, referred to by his pen name as C. S. Lewis, is a sci-fi writer and totalist activist, advocating for atheist messages within literature. History Early life Lewis was born to an ordinary professional-class household of Belfast in the north of Ireland. His father was a successful police prosecutor. His mother died while he and his only sibling, Warren, were still young. He endured a singularly unhappy childhood in the British public (i.e., private) schools of the period. He was the object of repeated beatings by other boys. The young Lewis took refuge in bizarre fantasies involving animals and began a fascination with the occult that would greatly affect his later career. In September 1913, Lewis enrolled at Malvern College, where he would remain until the following June. It was during this time that 15-year-old Lewis abandoned his childhood Christian faith and became an atheist, becoming interested in mythology and the occult. After leaving College he moved to study privately with William T. Kirkpatrick, his father's old tutor and former headmaster of Lurgan College. The Weltkrieg Since Lewis’ brother, Warren, had already become a second lieutenant, in 1917 Lewis volunteered for the British Army as the Weltkrieg raged on and underwent officer’s training (it is here that Lewis met his roommate, Paddy Moore). After completing training, he commissioned an officer in the Third Battalion, Somerset Light Infantry. Lewis arrived at the front line in the Somme Valley in France on his nineteenth birthday, and experienced trench warfare for the first time. On 15 April, Lewis was wounded during the Great Western Offensive, being hospitalised after the battle. Whilst in hospital, Lewis suffered with minor shellshock, experiencing mild hallucinations of lions and witches coming out of the medicinal cabinets. He eventually recuperated and was returned to duty in October, being assigned to Andover, England. His former roommate and friend, Paddy Moore, was killed in battle, this event reinforced Lewis’ burgeoning atheist beliefs. He was discharged in December 1920, and soon returned to his studies as well as radical leftist politics. Lewis wrote positively of his military service. He remarked of his time in the trenches that "this is what Homer wrote of," though he dismissed the war as merely an occasion "to meet the great goddess ‘Nonsense’." Post-Weltkrieg & Revolution After Lewis returned to Oxford University, he received a degree in Greek & Latin literature in 1921, and a degree in Philosophy & Ancient History in 1922. In 1923 he began working for Oswald Mosley's Independent Labour Party, creating propaganda to spread the syndicalist message and call to revolution. His work for Mosley is acknowledged to have developed a fetching style that could have won him a conventional academic career, however, his active involvement with Syndicalist political groups ruined his hopes for university advancement, and he was expelled from Oxford University within the year, having never completed his English degree. When the revolution began, Lewis took to the streets. He was able to convince his elder brother Warren (who was now a lieutenant in charge of the London Armoury) to open the armoury to the revolutionary mob, who proceeded to take control of the South London Armoury after many hours of fighting. During the fighting, Lewis had his arm broken which led to nearly a year in hospital. After the revolution and the formation of the Union of Britain, Lewis became the Propaganda Minister for the Maximists and began organising their early propaganda campaigns, helping to cement the faction early on. Lewis regarded this period as the happiest of his life, as he put it, he wrote successful propaganda "with his tongue in his cheek and the printer's devil by the door, and no one able to call him a nonentity ever again." Novel Work Lewis saw his life's mission as one of rooting out Christianity from the British Isles, and felt that he wasn’t helping to achieve this fast enough with his Maximist propaganda work, and so in 1928 he stepped down as the Maximist Propaganda Minister and began writing a sci-fi book with underlying atheist themes, “Into the Silent Planet.” Receiving widespread critical acclaim it was touted by critics as a “perfect first book for anyone doubting religion and seeking an alternative.” Two sequels were published in 1933 (Journey to Jupiter) and 1935 (That Glorious Strength), completing the so-called Cosmic Trilogy. Personal Life *Lewis is good friends with fellow writers Eric Blair, Enid Blyton and H. G. Wells, with the four having established a publishing house called the “Writer’s Union.” *The “Writer’s Union” is a publishing house created to praise the use of socialist values in literature and encouraged the reading of socialist literature over the Imperialist literature dominated by Winston Churchill, Arthur Conan Doyle, Erich Paul Remark and J. R. R. Tolkien. *Lewis is a supporter of an invasion of Ireland, as he sees the religious tensions between the different Christian branches within the Irish nation (especially his home of Northern Ireland) as being poisonous, and only being solved by the implementation of state atheism and socialism. Lewis’ state atheist beliefs are shared by his close friend Eric Blair, and opposed by his colleague, H. G. Wells. Category:People Category:Europeans Category:British-related topics Category:Authors